"Everyone in jazz who counts is up there. Think of a name." I scan for Miles Davis and R.J. folds his arms looking satisfied.
"When Stevie Wonder and Anita Baker are back in town, they'll stop by. And you see the top of the bar?" I note that the long white counter replicates the look of a piano keyboard. "When Liberace heard about it, he sent a guy here to check it out and put the design around his swimming pool."
Music venues in the northern suburbs offer intriguing possibilities as well, but if you want to venture beyond Detroit proper over the weekend, consider waiting until morning for a drive east along Lakeshore to Grosse Pointe, where stately mansions stand back from Lake St. Clair. Or take a day trip 40 miles west to Ann Arbor for a quintessential college town tour. Traverse the University of Michigan's "Diag," the tree-lined central plaza, and meander onto outlying streets to discover a campus comfortably woven through residential neighborhoods. Stop for lunch at Dominick's on nearby Monroe Street, an Italian cafe inside an old house with a fountain on its backyard plaza. Seating out front includes an exterior view of the Gothic law quadrangle across the street.
After you leave the central campus, take a short drive north to Gallup Park and watch wild geese patrol the shore of the Huron River. And for a moment of grandeur before departing Ann Arbor's otherwise modest dimensions, honor the gridiron gods at the 107,501-seat expanse of Michigan Stadium. The football stadium, the largest in the country and known as the "Big House," is often open for public viewing in the off-season.
As affluent economic counterpoints to Detroit, Grosse Pointe and Ann Arbor illustrate the severe disparities that have come to characterize the area. As you head home, the contrasting images will probably prompt reflection, interwoven with the sound of jazz and the smell of souvlaki.
Erik Gleibermann can be reached at eg@socraticsmentoring.com.